


Hi - Bruce

by PokeeArt



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Gotham (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Bruce is Messed Up in this Guys!!, Canon-Typical Violence, Date Rape Drug/Roofies (mentioned), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Friendship, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Recreational Drug Use (brief), References to Depression, Season/Series 04, Self-Acceptance, Selina Kyle is Catwoman, Swearing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-07
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-23 18:47:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17688908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PokeeArt/pseuds/PokeeArt
Summary: Bruce just stares at her and Selina wonders if this is the right thing to do. She had come here to scold him for the fiasco at the Sirens earlier but it seems he’s gotten over it. She wonders if he was as drunk as he pretended to be.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this warped idea for a while bouncing around inside my head and let's face it y'all. Bruce gots mental illness. That is heavily shown and talked about all through out this story so please be careful. Trigger warnings at the end notes.
> 
> Also this story will probably be slow to update (if I even write more for this monster)

The night was already long and annoying. Most of their customers where teenagers during the week nights nearing the weekend. The club was crowded and loud, people screaming and shouting, grinding and kissing. It wasn’t normal behavior for the Sirens at all. Normally that stuff happened but not to the ear shattering extent it was getting to tonight.

Selina had tucked herself in an empty corner and hoped it was enough so Tabby wouldn’t find her and demand she speak to her ‘peers’ about their out of hand behavior. Selina took to watching them rave and rumble around each other. A certain patch of brown hair caught her attention.

She’d seen the newspapers and gossip rags so she’s not terribly surprised to see Bruce Wayne dancing like a limp noodle with a large group of rowdy teens. His long limbs were awkward as he flails around. One of the boys of the group leans in and says something to Bruce that has the brunette throwing his head back and laughing. 

Selina’s so distracted by Bruce and his stupid entourage she doesn’t spot Tabby until it’s too late.

“So this is where you’ve been.”

Selina doesn’t jump but she does jerk her eyes away from the dance floor. “What now?”

“Your friends are acting a little too crazy. Go settle them down.” The older woman commands. Selina rolls her eyes.

“They’re not my friends.” She says snipiedly back. Tabby raises an eyebrow and turns her head to the dance floor, no doubt spotting Bruce and assuming something. “He’s not my friend.” She says quickly.

Tabitha rolls her eyes this time. “Right. He’s your boyfriend. Whatever. Just get them to calm down.” She stomps off, eyeing an older gentleman on the other side of the club.

Selina sighs and slowly extracts herself from her corner and walks in the direction of the dance floor. Luckily Bruce and his mob detach from the crowd and head over to the bar, making the noise level decrease immensely. 

Selina slinks to an empty booth and sits so she can watch both the dance floor and the bar. Bruce is leaning into another girls space, both of them giggling and touching each other. Selina grits her teeth and glances over to the other kids in the group.

One of the boys takes something out of his pocket and drops it into one of the many drinks resting on the counter. Selina’s hair stands on edge and she half rises before she notices Bruce watching the boy over the girls shoulder. Surely he’d do something to stop that creep.

The kids tries to hand the no doubt roofied drink to the girl who’s draped over Bruce but the brunette give a loud gauff and takes it instead. The other boy looks scared for all of three seconds before he’s laughing to and clinking their glasses to together. Selina sits back down.

She should probably stop watching in case Bruce felt her stare but she couldn’t help herself. This is a side to Bruce Wayne she never got to see, not really. He can’t hold his liquor for shit it seems and he’s apparently very charming while under its influence. She figured he’d be a weak drinker but the way he downs shots and then hoots makes her stomach clench uncomfortably. 

The girl practically sitting on Bruce’s lap gets up, patting his arm and heading off somewhere. The creep and Bruce are alone with the roofied drink clenched in Bruce’s hand. The girl is safe and Selina doesn’t need to keep watching.

Bruce says something to the other boy then grins, all sharp and dangerous in a way Selina’s never seen on him, before throwing his head back and drinking the entire beverage with one long swallow. 

Selina gasps, shocked and confused as to why he’d purposely drink something he had to have known was roofied. It’s like he hear her somehow. Bruce looks up and immediately meets her eyes. They stare at each other for a beat before a sudden figure comes into Selina’s frame of vision.

It’s Barbra, hands on her hips, and she looks ticked.

“What’s cooking?” Selina offers nonchalantly. 

“Where’d Tabby go?” The blonde detemainds. Selina shrugs and glances off the side, acting bored simply with the hope that Barbra would leave.

“You’re allowed to talk to him.”

That snaps Selina out of her fake funk. “Huh?”

“The billionaire brat. You could go talk to him.” Barbra offers, giving her a look that implies how dumb she thinks Selina is.

“He’s not my friend.”

“Oh, I know. But still. Jealous is any ugly shade on you.” Barbra snipes back before strutting off to find Tabitha. 

Selina glares at the older woman’s back as she walks away but movement in the background catches her attention.

Bruce is grabbing onto the front of the guy who roofied his drink. The guy seems uncomfortable but Bruce doesn’t seem to mind, leaning and putting all his weight on the guy as he hold him up. Something doesn’t feel right about this and Selina slowly stands.

Bruce’s body jerks once, twice, before he’s vomiting all over the other boy. The creep shouts in surprise and shoves Bruce away. The brunette stumbles, looking like he’s about to land face first on the floor. He has his hands attempting to cover his mouth but it seems like he’s not done yet.

Selina’s halfway there when he pukes again. This time it lands on the floor near an older couple, who also shriek when they notice. Selina spots security moving for Bruce as well and speeds her pace.

Bruce’s pale face starts to come into focus as she gets closer and she realizes how bad he looks. He’s shaking and his eyes are wide, wild and glazed. Who knows how much he’s already drank before that roofied one? Had he even known that is was drugged?

Selina doubts her previous thought and feels a spike of guilt. Bruce got roofied under her watch. And maybe he deserved it but no one should get roofied. Not in here, not in this self proclaimed safe place.

Just as she’s close enough to call out to him security grabs his upper arm and tugs him toward the exit. She can hear Bruce’s mumbled blabbering and relaxes slightly. He’s fine, most of the drug has got to be out of his system with the way he’d puked. The alcohol too. He’ll be fine.

Selina turns to the group who has come closer to the bar in curiosity at the noise. She spots the boy who drugged the drink and storms up to him. He reeks already but he gives her a flirtatious look.

She knocks it off his face with her fist.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After explaining to Tabby and Barbra neither of them are too mad about it. They are mad about the vomit and how they had to kick everyone out after Selina had knocked the kids lights out.

Neither mention the fact of who got roofied but Selina can feel the unasked question hanging in the air. They want to know why she let it happen. They really think she’s cold hearted enough to let someone she has bad blood with get roofied.

She offers to help clean the glasses for the night as an apology. Barbra readily agrees before heading off to bed. Tabby gives her a suspicious look before following after the taller woman. 

Selina doesn’t clean the glasses. She heads out to confront the one person who continually makes her life a confusing hell. 

Wayne Manor is just as big and ridiculous as she remembers it. It’s been several long months since she even been on the grounds. It’s strange to look up at the building and feel a sense of familiarity she doesn’t want. She quickly nudges the window doors she always came in from open with little resistance. 

The room smelled odd. It was the first thing she noticed as the fluttering curtains tickled her sides. She crept quietly further into the study and did a quick glance round. Nobody was in the room. It made sense, it was almost three in the morning. 

Selina wandered down the hall closer and closer to the origin of the odd scent. It trailed through the hallway and almost smelled like a dirty alleyway she’d walk by everyday. Smoke.

Bruce’s door wasn’t closed all the way and the smell only intensified the close she got to the giant wooden door. Smoke but not gunsmoke. No, that was sharp and made her eyes water. This smell was sharp as well but with a blunt edge to it. Something intoxicating and disturbing at the same time.

Slipping past the cracked door silently wasn’t even a problem. Selina slowly kept walking into the younger boy’s room. She spotted him sitting on his bed but couldn’t quite figure out what he was doing. His silhouette slouched, head going down between his knees, and a spark of light caught her attention. She could only see the side of his face as his head bobbed back up.

Weak, faint smoke drifted up from the blunt hanging between Bruce’s fingers and Selina watched disbelievingly as the teen raised it to his mouth and take a long drag. She stepped forward, not really believing her eyes and forgetting for a second where she was. The floorboard creaked under her boot and she froze. 

Bruce turned his head slightly in her direction but otherwise didn’t move. Selina felt her heart pounding fast in her chest. She wasn’t sure what to do. Sure, she needed to talk to Bruce, but this was something she never saw happening. She had no idea how to react. 

It makes a certain kind of sense considering everything else the brat of a teen had been doing. Under age drinking is different than drugs that she’s completely sure came from the streets. Bruce would have no idea how to even tell the good stuff from the stuff that will leave you wishing you were dead. Selina took a breath and prepared herself to speak to Bruce but was cut off when his dry chuckle echoed in the empty room.

“Hi Selina. What would Alfred think, seeing you creeping into my bedroom so late at night?” The brunette teases, tilting his head back and offering a smirk. Selina makes a sour face and stomps the rest of the way over to his bed. 

“But of course you’re here for something. It’s always something.” He says, voice dropping dangerously and he lifts the blunt back to his lips.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

Bruce just glances at her with half squinted eyes. She huffs and gestures to the blunt still about a foot from his face.

“Awh c’mon Selina. You know what I’m doing. Smoking, duh.” He wiggles his head a little and rolls his eyes. Selina’s blood boils.

“You have no idea what you’re doing!” Selina shouts. That at least seems to catch his full attention. He jerks confusingly before sending her a dirty look.

“Yelling isn’t going to stop me. It also won’t wake Alfred.”

Selina opens her mouth to shout again anyway but remembers that the butler isn’t in the house. At least not anymore. She glares down at him, crossing her arms and ignores the steady stream of smoke curling around his head. 

He stares at her for a long moment before sighing and scooting to the side of the bed, making room for her to sit next to him. Selina hesitates before sitting down. Bruce blinks sluggishly as the bed dips and offers the blunt to her.

Selina looks down at it and debates about taking it. Eventually she does and takes a hit for herself. She closes her eyes as she breathes in and opens them when she exhales. Bruce is watching her, amusement in his brown eyes. 

“Didn’t think you were the type.”

“Oh what and you are?” She snipes back and takes another quick hit before handing it back. Bruce chuckles and toys with the blunt before meeting her eyes again. 

“I’m a lot of things now.”

“Like?”

Bruce just stares at her and Selina wonders if this is the right thing to do. She had come here to scold him for the fiasco at the Sirens earlier but it seems he’s gotten over it. She wonders if he was as drunk as he pretended to be.

“Bruce, c’mon. Really. All you are is some jerky rich kid blowing his money for fun.”

Bruce grins, something ugly and so un-Bruce like Selina’s skin crawls, and leans further back in the bed. “That’s a brilliant deduction! What else?”

Selina growls and shifts to face him head on. “You’re being a massive douchebag for some reason and you fired Alfred because of it. And to me it seems like you deserve it.”

“Deserve it?” He snaps back, strange grin turning into a warning of bared teeth. “You think I-”

Bruce cuts himself off and jerks the blunt up to his lips and hisses out the smoke, eyes wild and angry. Selina waits him out.

“You think I deserve to feel like shit all the time? I deserve to only feel like pretending to be a person when there’s alcohol in my hands?”

“That sounds like a you problem to me.”

He laughs, half choking on the smoke still weakly circling the air. “Me. That’s right, I am the problem.” He says, voice taking on a weird quality she’s never heard of before. He takes another hit and vaguely stick his hand in her direction.

Selina takes it from him but doesn’t do anything with it, watching the flames bleed out smoke. They stay silent for a moment before she clears her throat. “What happened.”

“I’m not nearly as high as I need to be to even try to tell you that.”

Selina glares at him and holds the blunt closer to herself. Bruce catches the movement and snorts, unimpressed. The silence stretches out and Selina regrets even coming.

“Bruce...What are you doing? Really? What’s going on?”

Bruce scans her face and shakes his head. “Nothing.”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“Am I?” He says, cold and indifferent, like he doesn’t care about anything and it’s so not Bruce that Selina growls and grabs the front of his turtleneck.

“This is why you deserve it. People care about you, you dipshit, and you go and ruin it.”

Bruce seems shocked for all of two seconds before simply slumping in her hold. That alone surprises her enough to let go. That was supposed to light the fire in his emotionless eyes but instead he looks worse, eyes unfocussed and staring off into some distant corner of the room.

She pulls back into her own space and puffs on the blunt. It’s small enough now she should just get rid of it. She drops it on the ground and scuffs the heat out with the heel of her shoe. They sit in silence for another moment and Selina decides she’s done.

As she goes to stand Bruce’s weak tone halts her.

“I’m tired of being.”

Nothing else. Selina can feel her heartbeat in her ears. “Being what?” She questions, fearing the answer.

“Being, Selina.” He pauses as if thinking over his next words carefully. “I’m tired of being Bruce.”

She stays silent. She’s never been good with this stuff. And yeah she’s had the same thoughts but there’s nothing you can do really. You can’t be someone else.

She tells him that and he scoffs, nose up at her.

“Forget it. You don’t understand. I knew you wouldn’t.”

“Cut the shit, Bruce. I’m here aren’t I?”

“You’re here to get an explanation out of me because of what happened at the club. You’re here to make sure I’m not choking on my own vomit, or is that too much of a stretch? You’re here because you want to make me feel bad about what happened. I know.” He hisses back, glaring at her and then the floor where the discarded blunt lies. 

“I know.” He weakly affirms. 

“I’m not.” She says, half lying but she can’t stand the blank look on his face. It’s like he’s closed the curtains and pulled on a mask she can’t understand, leaving her in the confusing and frightening dark, alone. “I’m not here to make you feel bad.”

Bruce snorts and leans his body away from her. Her stupid heart aches and she’s pissed all over again.

“If you don’t think you deserve it then fight.”

“What?” Bruce laughs, turning his head back in her direction.

“Fight. Change. You’ve done it before.”

Bruce narrows his eyes at her. Selina holds firm.

“And I can do it again? Is that what you’re saying?” He sits up and moves to stand. “Stop being depressed Bruce, it’s not that hard. Just fight. Just change. Just do everything over and over and hope something goes different than last time.” He turns to her, his eyes dark and uncaring and so not Bruce. 

”No. Fuck you, Selina. You have no idea what I’m fighting. Get out of my house.”

She laughs, scoffing and standing too. 

“Who are you to tell me to fuck off?! I’m trying to help you, understand you, and you’re doing it again! This is what I mean! This is why you deserve it!” Selina yells back. Bruce twitches, like he wants to strike out and hit her but doesn’t. 

“Bruce Wayne isn’t your friend anymore, Bruce Wayne isn’t interested in you anymore, Bruce Wayne doesn’t give two shits about you, Selina! You stopped being his friend the moment you walked out and never came back!” He suddenly screams. 

“We were never anything to begin with.” She responds harshly. “You stopped being my friend the moment you stabbed me in the back.”

“I didn’t-! You don’t understand! You had something with him and it’s gone and fucked and it’s my fault and his fault and- and I’ve done everything to just hold us together but you have no idea what it’s like. None!”

“You haven’t done shit! You lied to me again and then pulled the douchebag act. Well, congrats. It finally worked. I’m out of here.” She turns to leave but Bruce darts out an arm and grabs her wrist.

Selina flings his hand off her and whips around to snarl at him, but the look in his eyes stops her. He’s glaring at her but it isn’t angry. It’s hurt and pain and something that shocks her. There’s tears hanging on the corner of his eyelashes.

“Bruce Wayne cares about you, Selina. He probably always will. Please. If you understand anything understand that.”

He steps back, hand falling to his side as he looks away from her. 

Selina pauses, her thoughts stuttering all over the place. Something tells her it’s important the way he’s talking but she’s also pissed and hurt and high and she needs to get out of here before either of them do something horrible. She sighs and turns to leave. 

“Maybe Bruce Wayne’s the one who needs to understand that.” She grumbles before exiting the room and leaving Bruce in the smoke and stars of the night.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina drops off the grid for a bit after that. She leaves a note for Tabby to find but leaves the next morning. She wants to feel different. She wants to do something that won’t make her feel like shit. 

Count on Bruce to fuck up her emotions again.

She tries not to think of him in the coming days but sometimes it hard. They were both high and tired and angry and usually that’s when people are most honest. Most hurtful too. But the things he said don’t make as much sense out of context now.

Selina knew he suffered from some kind of deep sadness but she’d never thought it was severe enough for him to label it depression. And he had just bluntly said it, unashamed and not trying to hide it, that was very much unlike her Bruce. He hid things like emotion and confusion in the vein hope to look stronger than he was.

And the attitude he had the whole time made Selina second guess if she even went at all. Maybe she just dreamed the other Bruce, the one who was cold and indifferent but so desperately holding onto some kind of ill will of hope, the one who wasn’t Bruce but the billionaire brat or the drunk teenager.

But she knows deep down that it was real. Maybe one of the first real conversations she’s ever had with the brunette after months of not speaking to each other. She’s not worried, she tells herself and she shouldn’t care anyway.

It’s hard to not think of him late at night so she does what she does best. Selina goes out to do some good fashioned pickpocketing. The grubby part of Gotham she’s in is perfect for tonight. 

She’s tailing an older looking woman when she spots something, someone, that makes her stop in her tracks. 

Alfred is standing outside a nearby dinner, eyes downcast and hands lighting a cigarette, as the light rain trickles down the windows. She steps to the side and watches for a curious moment. She’s never seen the older man smoke before, or drink or any unsavory thing. Alfred’s movements are slow and almost bored looking. He lifts the cigarette to his lips and looks around tiredly. 

Selina hesitates but she’s always been a curious cat. She makes her way across the street to the dinner.

Alfred must spot her before she gets close enough to speak.

“No, absolutely not. Turn around and go.” He commands, his accent filling her with brief amusement. 

“That’s not something you say to an old friend.”

“You were nothing but a nuisance to me.” Alfred pauses and looks her over quickly. “But that was before, I suppose. What is it you want?” He asks, exhaustion clear in his voice. 

Selina side stepped so she was standing beside the older man and under the dinner’s tarp and out of the rain. “I can’t catch up with an old nuisance?” Alfred gives her a hard look and she rolls her eyes. “Fine. Why aren’t you at the Manor?”

“I don’t live there anymore.” 

Silence. An unspoken answer.

“He said he fired you.”

“He did.”

Selina shuffled a little, uncomfortable with the tone of the older man’s voice. “Alfred?”

He glances at her and sighs, dropping the cigarette to the ground and snuffing it out. “Listen here, whatever you think you’re doing, I suggest you stop. That boy doesn’t want anybody's help. He sure as hell wouldn’t want you poking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”

Selina grits her teeth. She’d almost forgotten how speaking to this butler always felt like she was being scolded and treated like a child. A way to stay humble she thought with bitterness. 

“Yeah, well. He might not want it but he needs it.”

Alfred stared at her, unimpressed but with a worried glint in his eyes.

“He was at the Sirens the other day, drank something that was roofied. He knew that but he did it anyway. I went to talk to him and he was smoking pot. He was talking all weird and...different.” She explains, suddenly anxious to be doing so. Why should she even care to let Alfred know this? Surely the man is just as willing to let Bruce Wayne drift out of his life.

“Thanks for that. But what I am suppose to do? I am no longer his guardian. He’s allowed to do as he pleases. That’s what he wanted.” The older man hisses, accent ticking up with bitterness. 

“He said he was depressed.”

The silence is scary, she can feel the conflict inside the other man and hates that she feels it inside herself as well. The sharp spike of worry and concern mixed with anger and vague displeasure. 

“Yes, well. That’s not surprising.” Is all he says, but the emptiness of the sentence gets to Selina. 

“Alfred, c’mon. I know you care about him. He...He needs someone like you right now.” She tries.

Alfred turns so they’re face to face. “I care for that boy like he’s my own, but that doesn’t matter no more. That boy doesn’t care about me. He wouldn’t listen to me to begin with, nothing’s changed since then.”

Selina searched his eyes and only found the seriousness and hurt there. She growls and stomps out from under the tarp.

“I don’t know why I thought this was a good idea. Have a nice life, Alfred. Seeyah never.” She spits before walking back across the street. 

She doesn’t look back.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina looks forward. She regrets coming here but she’s too invested to give up now.

The hospital’s white walls hurt her eyes and make her on edge. She stares at the two janky chairs just outside the emergency E.R. entrance. She can almost picture what happened months ago. The shattered look on Bruce’s face, the dried blood on his arms and chest, the wild starved gleam to his soft brown eyes. The inevitable moment he tossed her out of his life, again.

‘You sure as hell don’t care about me.’ rings in her mind. She leaves before anymore can spot her where she shouldn’t be. 

Bruce was wrong then and he’s wrong now.

Selina’s lost too many friends to give up on the ones she has left. Bruce Wayne might not want her help but he’s going to get it anyway. 

But she can’t do all this alone. No, she needs someone else who feels as she does. And that, that might be more difficult than talking herself into this half baked plan to talk to Bruce.

Alfred wasn’t much help a couple of days ago, who else does Bruce think of as a father figure?

Oh. Right. Well, she thinks as she makes her way across the rooftops, maybe a cop would be more equipped to handle this than she is.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Turns out Jim Gordon is a very busy man. Selina would bet he’s one of the only cops who actually gets thing done in this city. But she sneaks past the other cops and perches on the captains desk. 

It takes about two minutes before Jim’s breaded partner appears. The man looks shocked before grumbling and sitting down before asking what she wants. 

“I need to talk to Gordon.”

“Yeah, well join the team. I haven’t seen him since this morning. So scram alright.” The older man waves a hand at her and focuses on something on his desk. 

Selina holds the silence, thinking of a quick way to get what she wants. “It’s about Bruce Wayne.”

The older man, Bullock she remembers, looks up at her quickly, judgement all over his scraggly face. “Bruce Wayne, huh?”

“Yeah, he’s in trouble. Gordon likes to help people in trouble right?”

Bullock continues to stare at her to the point where she’s tempted to poke him in the face to see if he’s frozen before he responds. “The only trouble Bruce Wayne is in right now is alcohol addiction and the misuse of the funds he should safe for college being used to throw stupid teen filled parties.” 

Selina huffs, amused against her will at the man’s phasing. “It’s a bit more than that.”

“Sure. Read the newspaper, kitty. It’s all in there.” Bullock says and tosses todays newspaper into her lap. She flips through it with a bored expression. 

She never cared for the media’s view on Bruce, it was always negative or overly pitying. But the article is all about another big bash thrown at Wayne Manor. Vague mentions and implications that Bruce slept with several girls over the span of the night but nothing she hadn’t read before. Selina grunts and tosses it back.

“Thanks for nothing, cop.”

Bullock shrugs, and lifts his coffee to drink. “I’ll let Jim know you stopped by.”

“Sure, whatever, forget it.” Selina grumbles and leaves quickly. 

That didn’t work at all. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina resigned herself to never figuring this out and put it on the backburner. She went back to the club a couple days later. Barbra gave her a suggestive look when she passed by, eyebrows raised and half of a goofy smile on her face that made Selina blush despite wanting to yell at the older woman.

Tabitha was much more tactical about her assumptions. She simply asked how Selina’s boyfriend was. Selina had sputtered before shouting that she didn’t have a boyfriend! Tabby just smirked and took a sip of her bourbon. 

Selina would say she hated them but she couldn’t, not really, not after everything they’ve done for her. But she was damn tired of being reminded of the brunette everytime she thought she was done thinking about him. 

She did her best to forget and go back to work. And if she happened to scan the crowd for the familiar curls of brown who could judge her. She doesn’t see him. 

She can’t figure out if she’s relieved or worried and it makes her angry and sick. Bruce really does have to come and taint every aspect of her life. 

She figures tonight is a good night to go out and bash some low life scum skulls and nab their cash while she’s at it. It’s simple enough to prowl in the more dangerous parts of Gotham, waiting for the right opportunity. 

What she doesn’t expect is the figure in all black erupting from the shadows just has she thinks she’s found her mark. The two men, armed but intoxicated and most likely drug dealers of some kind, shout in surprise but it doesn’t matter. Their down and out seconds after the figure emerged. The speed and violence shock her, she’s never seen someone move like that before.

It stands over them for a long moment before slowly turning its head in her direction. She feels a jolt of fear from her hiding place on the fire escape.

Whatever it is, it’s human, at least sort of. The lower part of its face is exposed, chin and cheeks peeking out from the material of the masks it’s wearing. That’s the only place Selina sees any skin. But the shape is definitely human.

“Come out.” Deep and rumbly in a way Selina thinks must be artificial. She doesn’t move from her spot. The figure stares impossibly at where she is before suddenly turning and strutting down the alleyway. 

Selina gets a weird itch in the back of her head so she listens to her curiosity and follows the dark figure. Surely it knows she doing it as well but it doesn’t call out to her again.

She follows the figure as it gives the smack down to three other groups of thugs. It’s amusing to watch this swatch of black move so fluidly and kick all these shitheads asses. It’s like its one with the shadows. She doubts more and more whether the figure is human as the night goes on. 

The fourth fight is where it happens. It takes on a group of about five men who were harassing a woman a couple blocks down. The first four seem as easy as the others of the night but Selina sees something the figure doesn’t. A flash of silver in the moonlight and she’s moving before she can fully think about it. 

It doesn’t matter. The figure whips around and grabs the man’s wrist, twisting with ease and jerking hard before jumping away. The man cries out, wrist most likely broken, as the knife clatters to the ground. Selina slows her decent but doesn’t stop.

The figure stands over the five downed men and seemingly stares at the ground in front of it. Selina’s on the ground when the metal trash bin behind the figure rustles with movement. 

The figure turns sharply to face it and even Selina drops into a fighting stance.

A long pause.

A orange tabby cat jump out from behind the can with an unholy screech before darting down the alleyway. Selina lets out a breath and sees the figure do the same.

Movement out of the corner of her eye jolts her out of her stupor. But the figure is turned away from the movement and doesn’t see it in time. 

One of the downed men grabbed the knife and reared up violently, silent but murderous expression on his ugly bleeding face, before stabbing the figure in the shoulder with an ungodly scream. 

The figure grunts in pain, kicking its legs out and knocking the man back to the ground. The knife stays inbedded in the figures shoulder. Selina is shocked but knows that this thing can probably handle itself. She wants nothing to do with this anymore and she makes her escape, done following the dark figure and totally willing to forget she even saw it.

But it stays in the back of her mind every time she prowls that area of town now. A dark protector resides here and she best be careful to make sure she’s not next.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bruce appears in the club the next day. It’s different though. His eyes are hollow and the bags under his eyes are more like ripe bruises. He’s as pale as a sheet and he’s staggering around like a lost lamb. He’s alone which is nice since he’s not rolling in with a huge mob of noisy teenagers. Selina figures he’s here to talk. 

She corners him in an empty booth away from the bar. “Bruce.”

He looks up, eyes frantic for a moment before he relaxes after realizing who had approached him. “Hi Selina.”

She sits down opposite of him and raises her eyebrows. Bruce just stares at the table top looking like he’s seconds from black in out. Selina sighs. He looks worse up close.

“What are you doing here, Bruce?”

He blinks a couple times and rests his hands on the table. “I’m here to say goodbye.”

Selina takes a minute to try and figure out what that means. “Goodbye? Where are you going?”

Bruce squirms in his seat and avoids eye contact. “Nothing you need to concern yourself with. I just thought I should let you know, in case you wonder like...like last time.”

He trails off and his eyes glaze over. Selina doesn’t like where this is going at all. “Bruce, please. I don’t care where you go. I’m no your keeper.”

The brunette turns his attention back to her but it’s different. She feels like she’s looking a ghost. 

“No. No, you aren’t.” He says softly. 

They stare at each other for a couple more moments before Bruce’s eyes unfocus again. Selina bites her lip.

“When’s the last time you slept?”

“I’m fine. Don’t worry.” He faintly replies, like he’s not really listening anymore. Selina huffs and rests her elbows on the table. 

“You can’t even keep your eyes focussed right now, Bruce. Don’t lie to me.”

Something snaps in his demeanor. His head whips back to look her in the eyes and he’s no longer looking like a lost soul but an angry wronged phantom. His jarring focus on her as her stammering. 

“I am not lying to you.” He growls, face scrunched in anger before it slowly drops. “I’m tired but it’s not...It’s not because I’m missing sleep.”

Selina feels her gut tighten because that along with the weird admittance to leaving soon strings together a scary picture in her head. “Bruce.” She says warningly. 

He glances at her, slight confusion but mostly amusement in his twitching lips. “Thank you. For..For caring about me.”

Selina likes this even less. “Bruce.”

“I know it probably hasn’t been easy but still. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

“Bruce Wayne, you goddamn bastard.” Selina hisses, leaning forward to get into the younger man’s face. Bruce blinks and leans away from her, shocked. “If you’re doing what I think you’re trying to do, I will kick your ass so hard you won’t be able to move.”

“Selina!” He huffs a dry laugh but his eyes dart nervously around, “What are you talking about?”

“You know what I’m talking about.”

Bruce’s whole body seems to go slack and he stares sightlessly into her eyes. Selina feels the world tilt dangerously. “Bruce.” She says breathlessly. “Don’t.”

The brunette’s eyes stay stuck staring off and he doesn’t seem to have heard her. Selina shakes her head and quickly moves to sit beside him instead of opposite. As she tucks herself against his side he starts shaking. “Bruce, look. I don’t- I don’t know a lot about this but listen, I’m here. I...I care about you, okay?”

Bruce doesn’t respond and his tremors don’t stop. Selina rests her head on his shoulder. “I...I would miss you if you were gone. So don’t, don’t do what I think you want to.”

“I can’t do this. I can’t- I” Bruce suddenly wheezes, curling into himself with a quick jerk. Selina pulls her head up and tries to look at his face. His breathing is getting all weird and stunted. “I can’t pretend anymore, oh god.” His voice wobbles dangerously and it sounds like he’s about to sob.

Selina pulls one of his hands away from it position near his face and holds tight. “Bruce, it’s going to be alright.”

“S-Selina? What? Where’s- Where’s....” Bruce swallows, eyes huge and darting around, and Selina holds her breath. It feels like he’s back and aware somewhat of what’s going on.

“Bruce, just breathe okay? I think you just had a panic attack.” She tries to soothe but the last couple words have him tensing up and uncurling. 

“I can’t be here. I need to go.”

“Bruce, no.”

“The Shaman won’t want- Where’s…” He trails off, eyes glazing over again and Selina is officially scared. She was worried about Bruce but she didn’t know it was this bad. 

She goes to try and offer more comforting words but Bruce cuts her off. “Where’s the blood?”

“What?” Selina asks, more out of shock than curiosity. 

Bruce is silent for a long moment. “I killed him, so where’s the blood?”

“Bruce, what are you talking about?”

Bruce finally looks at her then and it’s like no one’s there upstairs. His eyes are vacant and empty. Selina shivers and holds tighter to his hands.

“You didn’t kill anyone, Bruce.” She comforts. Bruce glances down at their hands and blinks. Some emotions start to bleed back to his person.

“But I did. I did. I wanted to do it.” He stares at their intertwined fingers. “I’d do it again.”

Selina is quiet and unsure what to say to that. Bruce sounds serious but he’s also obviously having some kind of break down. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. 

“Bruce, just calm down. It’s fine, you didn’t kill anyone.”

The brunette turns to her again and it’s almost so close to normal, he looks slightly confused but at ease nonetheless. Selina squeezes his hand. Bruce looks over her face before speaking again.

“Thank you, Selina. But I’m quite serious. I must be going now. It was good to talk with you again.” He stands, hand going limp and slipping out of her grasp before she can hold it tight. 

“You’re damned if you think I’m letting you leave after that. You need help, Bruce.”

“I can handle myself just fine, Selina. Now please move.”

She crosses her arms but stands. Selina doesn’t move, keeping Bruce standing in the booth seats. “I’ll move. If and only if you say it. Promise me.”

Bruce’s features turn thunderously dark for all of two seconds before he looks bone tired again. “Fine. I promise.”

Selina eyes him up and down, clears her throat and waits.

Bruce doesn’t bother to hide his angry expression this time. 

“I promise I won’t do anything to harm myself.”

She lets out a breath and steps aside. Bruce hesitates but quickly brushes past her and heads straight for the exit without another word. Selina turns and watches him, an uneasy feeling in her stomach. 

She can only hope she did the right thing. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina ends up tailing Bruce the next night. She tracks him from his Manor to the city. Originally she had gone to talk but how quickly Bruce was moving told her he wouldn’t be any more helpful than last time. 

Watching Bruce scamper around the back allies and pass by common citizens in his ratty oversized jacket would have been funny under different circumstances. Now she’s just worried.

He takes a sharp turn and picks up even more speed. She has no idea where he’s going but she picks up her pace as well, not wanting to lose him. 

Selina turns the corner and finds no one standing on the other side. Bruce is gone.

She whips around and barely is able to hear the slight sound of moving metal. The manhole cover, of course. Selina waits a few seconds before tugging the metal covering to the side and dropping down as quietly as she can. 

She sees the edge of Bruce’s coat dip past a close walkway. She wiggles her shoulders and commences stalk mode. Bruce won’t even notice she’s here. 

But honestly in the state he’s in he might not even know who she is. Bruce is stumbling and leaning on the walls the further into the tunnel they go. He stops to dry heave into the sewage floating by before practically throwing himself forward. Selina wonders if he’s intoxicated but how quickly he’s making turns and headed in a specific direction tells her he’s going somewhere he’s been before. And there is no way a drunk Bruce spends his time in the sewer. 

Slowly the tunnel starts to change shape and feeling. It no longer feels like a dirty sewage tunnel but something eerie and old sticks thick in the air. Selina doesn’t like it one bit and is tempted to let herself be known so they can both get out of here. 

Ahead Bruce lets out a loud almost painful sounding groan before falling to his knees. He’s sweating a lot and breathing all weird again. Selina risks getting closer and realizes the younger teen is speaking. 

Begging. Asking for forgiveness. Crying.

Selina pulls back, horrified and scared. She’s never heard Bruce like that. Desperate and broken. He thinks whatever he did is unforgivable and it shows even as he’s begging to be forgiven. 

The sudden possibility that Bruce did actually kill someone jolts across Selina’s mind and she’s shaken and so uneasy. 

Bruce doesn’t kill. Bruce doesn’t hurt unless he has to. Bruce isn’t some sobbing weak pathetic fanatic. Whatevers happened has changed him.

Or maybe Selina never really knew him at all.

It certainly didn’t feel like it the past couple of months. Bruce the Brat, the drunk, the whore and then Bruce the druggie, the ghost, the desperate mess. Maybe he was always these things and she never noticed. 

A short noise from ahead stopped her whirling thoughts. Bruce had thrown up and was hunched in on himself, but blissfully quiet. 

He seemed oddly at peace now compared to the raving lunatic he’d been moments ago. It sent chills down Selina’s spine. She was about to run back to the entrance when he spoke up again.

“We can’t keep doing this.”

Selina froze and tried to think up an excuse or a plausible reason he’d accept, if not understand. 

“Ra’s was right. We’re weak. You’re weak, Bruce.” is hissed hatefully. And Selina realizes he’s not talking to her at all. 

There’s a long tense silence.

“We need to be better. Get better. I can’t be the only thing holding us together. I won’t. Not forever.”

Selina is confused and thinks back to the weird way he was talking that night in the Manor. Referring to himself with his name instead of saying me or I. The way he’s talking now.

“It hurts.” He says, softer than the previous words and it’s- it really does sound different. Like- Like…

“It hurts to remember and then forget all over. They...they fucked me up and I’m all tangled. It’ll get better. E-Eventually.”

Selina thinks she’s heard enough and does what her instincts are yelling at her to do, flee.

As she’s running though she can hear footsteps that aren’t hers. She doesn’t think he’d have been strong or coherent enough to notice her or her movement and noise. 

But she reaches the man hole first and practically kicks it out of place before darting back up to the surface. She backtracks and rushes down the alleyway. Selina chances a glance backward.

She doesn’t expect the sudden arm around her chest that throws her to the ground and knocks all the air out of her lungs. She wants to scream and scratch but the blow had made her entire body dizzy and buzzing with pain.

Her eyes finally focus on the face of the person who attacked her and she should be shocked but really she’s pissed.

Bruce Wayne stands over her looking every bit confused as he should feel. 

“What the hell Bruce?!” She growls out and slowly works her way into standing. Bruce’s face evens out and he looks almost bored.

“Why were you following me?”

She doesn’t answer and rubs around her neck, shooting him a dark glare.

“Selina.” A demand.

“No. Actually, no, you don’t get to do that. Who are you? Who am I talking to right now?” Selina snarls out, lowering into a fighting stance.

“Wh-What?” Bruce steps back, obviously taken off guard. Selina advances.

“Are you that fucking clone? You’re fucked up enough to be. Your acting hasn’t improved though.”

“S-Selina, wait.” Another step back.

“What? I heard you down there. You were talking like a crazy person, like that riddle guy, like a clone would.”

“I’m not. I’m-I’m not a clone.”

“I don’t believe you, you crazy ass lunatic. I should push you out a window now, see if it feels as good as I was hoping.”

Bruce’s face is so white and bloodless Selina swears a clean sheet would be darker than his cheeks. But there’s also this emptiness she should have noticed before. The clone had looked that same way. He talked that way too. Empty, like he wasn’t even alive. 

“You’re going to suffer for tricking me. Even if your freak ass can’t feel it.” And she advances on him with lighting speed.

Bruce however is faster. He turns to dodge her attack and just keeps moving away from her instead of fighting back. It makes her blood boil.

She gets a good grip on her whip and jumps away at the right moment. Bruce is in a half turn, looking at her out of the corner of his eye and she lets loose.

The tip of the whip slaps the back of his shoulder and the sound alone makes her grin. She’s not going back on her word.

But the scream that comes out of Bruce is like that night. The night she’d stood there and watched as those pearls hit the dirty street of Gotham and as the blood of strangers splattered the alley way. It’s something she’s never wanted to hear again in her life.

Bruce crumples to the ground, weakly grabbing at his wounded shoulder and leaving his entire back open to her. His breath is getting all huffy and Selina remembers how that feels.

Holding in tears because the pain is so bad but everyone around her is worse. You can’t cry when you’re surrounded by enemies. 

She lowers her whip and tries not to feel regretful or guilty. Maybe...Maybe this isn’t another clone. Maybe this is Bruce.

She slowly inches closer to him. She doesn’t know what’s worse; that maybe she’d just really hurt Bruce or that she feels bad and this thing is the clone. 

There’s blood where her whip had hit. Bruce’s fingers are stained with it and she sees him bring his hand to look. He lets out a wheeze.

“Alfred.”

Selina shakes her head and gets as close as she dares. “What?”

“Alfred. Alfred’s dead. He’s- He’s!” Bruce stammers, eyes wild and frantic and glazed over in way that told her he wasn’t here. The abrupt movement of him jumping to his feet scares Selina enough for her to let him run past her out into the city.

“Bruce!” She shouts after him before giving chase. This isn’t how this was supposed to go at all. And if this isn’t even Bruce why is she bothering? How can she tell that it’s even him anymore?

Bruce is running like a madman, knocking into people but not stopping at all, rushing across the street without a single glance, speeding through Gotham city like he’s on a race track.

Selina rushes after but his legs are longer and he had a head start. It’s the panicky way he zigzags that has her worried. Bruce never took shortcuts. Destination A to B, that’s how he worked. Clone or no, they don’t know Bruce at all. 

He ends up skidding to a stop in front of a familiar looking dinner. He’s looking up at the sign when she finally catches up with him. His face is scared and hopeful and desperate.

He looks like a kid. 

Bruce darts into the dinner and Selina grabs the door before it can close, entering slower and trying to give this maybe Bruce time to calm down before she approaches him again. 

He’s jerking his head around wildly, looking for something. “Al-Alfred!” He shouts, voice breaking with emotion and Selina doubts with every passing moment that this is a clone.

The man in question stands from where he was seated near the back of the dinner.

“Bruce? What’re you-”

Bruce rushes up to the older man and immediately puts both his hands on Alfred’s chest. Not like a push but like he was holding down a wound. It clinks with Selina then. That’s where Alfred was hurt the last time. The weird hospital and ‘You sure as hell don’t care about me’. 

Alfred stutters and grabs Bruce’s hands, moving them away from himself. “What is going on here?!”

Bruce wheezes like a broken truck but he’s smiling, he’s real smiling and looking up at Alfred with brighter eyes than Selina had seen in days.

“You’re alive. You’re okay! You’re- You’re!”

Alfred glances over to her with a confused look. “What the bloody hell is going on? One of you better start explaining.”

Bruce, of course, takes this as his cue to past out. His eyes roll back into his head and he starts to fall forward. Alfred notices the movement and quickly drops the younger man’s hands to catch Bruce before he hits the floor. Selina jerks forward too, a spike of worry piercing through everything else. 

There’s concerned gasps from the rest of the dinner and Selina brittles. Alfred just carefully walks himself and the unconscious Wayne over to an empty booth. She follows and sits opposite of the butler and Bruce. 

And wow, Bruce still looks horrid but at least there’s a peaceful feeling to it now. His cheeks are still waxy and pale but his lips and eyebrows are more relaxed. He looks calm. 

Alfred clears his throat and sends her a pointed look before he starts looking over the unconscious Wayne. 

“I don’t know what happened. I was following him and he freaked out. I think. I think he’s a clone, Alfred.”

The older man stops his movements and stares at the sleeping face of the brunette. Selina sweats a little and waits for a response.

“I don’t think so mate. Five was never this...expressive. Hell, neither is Bruce but...No clone would act like that. Get- Get flashbacks or whatever happened.”

Selina blinks, because okay. There’s a lot there. The clone from before must be Five and she’s kind of pissed that thing got a name, even if it’s just a shitty number. And she was right in thinking that this isn’t Bruce because he doesn’t act like this, emotions over logic. And Alfred has a point about what must be flashbacks. Bruce must have had one of those at the club the other day, where he’d thought he had killed someone. Oh shit. 

“He thinks he’s killed someone.”

Alfred glances over at her before continuing to check over Bruce. “Did he say who?”

“N-No. But he wouldn’t do that. So- So there’s no one to say who.”

The butlers face goes through too many emotions for Selina to figure out but the overwhelming sense of dread is heavy in the air. 

“He has. He didn’t want to, but he had to.”

Selina remembers the moment in the club again. ‘I wanted to do it. I’d do it again.’ He had said. He was serious then. Bruce has killed someone. 

“Who?!” Selina hisses, suddenly upset that something like this would happened and neither of them told her anything. Why wouldn’t Bruce say something? Why would Bruce- Wait. 

Wait, was that why he kept going clubbing and getting drunk and let himself be roofied and smoke weed and look like shit? He was- He was suffering like she had when she’d- when she’d killed that old geezer years ago. 

He was self destructing. Like she had.

Alfred shook his head. “Not here, alright? We need to get him back to the Manor.” The older man goes to move Bruce again but notices the lines of blood on his hands and nudges the younger man forward. “Shit.”

Selina fights the urge to flush, knowing that’s where she’d hit him with the whip. “What?”

“He’s been stabbed. The dumb bastard didn’t even try to bandage it. Shit!” Alfred hisses and picks up to pace, tucking Bruce under his arm and hurrying out the door. Selina quickly follows after, confused at the brunette’s injury.

Stabbed? In the back of the shoulder? Recently too. She’d seen that somewhere else. She’d seen the figure a couple nights ago and it had gotten stabbed in that same spot. There is no way Bruce Wayne is that vicious, angry thing feasting on the ugly darkness of Gotham’s underbelly. 

There’s no way.

Right?


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The mirror is cruel and when he looks in it he sees someone else. A shadow of what he’s supposed to be. A crack down the Wayne name. A scared and cowardly child. Alone. 
> 
> He feels alone. 
> 
> His fist shatters the glass and he no longer feels anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I feel like this is a bit different than the first chap. and its more plot based (which I think is the difference between the two). Let me know what you think! Which is better etc etc.
> 
> Also! Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone who commented or left kudos or bookmarked, it means the world to me <3
> 
> This takes place with season 4 episode 13 and episode 14 as the plot base.

Darkness. Soft and warm and swarming. It’s safe here. It’s safe in the shadows. They will protect him. They always have. They hold him together like glue. 

But he still hears the ugly click of a gun.

Still hears the screams and blood and pearls and he starts to come apart.

Shiny shoes and static before everything he’s ever known disappears before his watery eyes.

The darkness had chosen to protect him then and he won’t let it regret saving him. He needs to mean something. He needs to do something to thank it. To let it know it didn’t make a mistake.

Even if he wishes almost daily that he had gone with his parents that night. But still, he’s grateful. He doesn’t know what he’d do without them. He needs them as much as they need him. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The ride over to Wayne Manor is awful and awkward. Alfred doesn’t say a word, holding tightly to Bruce and staring out the window with a pensive expression. Selina really feels like she shouldn’t even be here, but there’s too many things about Bruce nagging at her. She can’t leave until she’s gotten some answers.

They have to take a taxi too. They’re lucky the money in Alfred’s pocket covers it. He gets her to open the doors in front of him while he drags Bruce through the house.

Selina hesitates when approaching Bruce’s bedroom. The last time she was in there he’d been strange and smoking weed like some common low life of Gotham. He’d had the dead eyes, the eyes she should have noticed as a clones, and spoke all weird. 

But still she opens the large wooden doors and holds them open until Alfred passes. She watches as he careful rests Bruce’s unconscious body on the bed and sigh deeply. 

“Alright then. I believe you’ve got some explaining to do.” He says, tired all over his tone as he sits on the edge of the bed to face her. Selina shrugs before crossing her arms.

“I told you already.”

“Sorry if I was busy with something else. Say it again.”

Selina growls in warning but tells him again what she’d said at the dinner. “I was following him and he went down into the sewer, freaked out, and ran off like a lunatic.”

Alfred pales at the mention of the sewer and Selina quickly pounces on that. 

“What? He knew where he was going when he was down there. Your turn. Talk.”

Alfred gives her a glare but it dies and he looks older than ever. He closes his eyes as he talks, “That’s where...That’s where Bruce stabbed me.”

“Stabbed you?” Shocked at the mere thought Selina uncrosses her arms and moves closer. “He wouldn’t. Unless...Unless he is a clone.”

“He’s not!” Alfred snaps, eyes jerking back open and burning with rage. “That boy isn’t a copy or a fake. He cried, he mourned. That boy is real. I don’t gives a rats ass what you think.”

Selina scans the older man and finds herself agreeing. “Fine. But why? Bruce would never hurt someone unless he really had to. Especially not people he- he cares about.”

Another realization. He hadn’t fought back in the alley way. He’d just dodged and let her do as she pleased. He didn’t want to fight. Shit and she hurt him for that. 

Alfred seems to sense her conflicted emotions and pats the empty side of the bed. “It’s long and probably will sound crazy but I’ll tell you what I know.”

Selina nods and sits down next to him.

The butler tells her a story she’d honestly wished she hadn’t heard. She hates herself for ever thinking this Bruce could be anyone but who he is. She silently wonders why the world keeps making him suffer. Being kidnapped and practically brainwashed into almost destroying the city and then believing he’d killed the only family he had left. She can’t image if that was her. 

He says he doesn’t know much of what was done to Bruce but she can feel his dread and fear of it, of the unknown. Selina feels it too. She wants to ask who was strong enough to break Bruce, to strip him of his values and morals like they were wrapping paper. 

Alfred thinks they had him for a couple of weeks. He not even sure of that either. Selina can tell he feels guilty about that too but she stays quiet. The clone was so unBruce like even when he was performing she’d been able to tell them apart quite easily. 

“Who?” Selina finally growls, voice breaking with anger. Alfred shakes his head.

“It was all orchestrated by Ra’s Al Ghul. Or the Court of Owls. Or who the bloody hell knows. But the man that had Bruce then called himself the Shawman.”

Both those names clicked in Selina’s mind. She’d heard them before. 

The sewer, ‘Ra’s was right. We’re weak. You’re weak.’, and the conversation they had in the booth at the Sirens, ‘The Shawman won’t want-’ both ring in her ears.

“Who’s Ra’s Al Ghul?”

Alfred made a face that told her she’d asked the right question.

“Honestly? I don’t know where this geezer came from. He wants Bruce for something. Weird poetic bullshit talk. I don’t know.”

Selina frowns and tucks that away for later. “I’m not done yet. Who did he kill, Alfred?”

The butler stills and stares at the floor. Selina follows his gaze and spots the mark she’d left when she had snuffed that blunt out several weeks ago. She feels the urge to laugh at the absurdity of it. 

Alfred clears his throat to start explaining when Bruce chokes on a noise and bolts up right. 

Both of them are off the bed and by his side in seconds. Alfred immediately is offering reassuring words and strong statements. Selina offers a grounding touch and grabs his uninjured shoulder.

His wild, unfocussed eyes settle on them and he relaxes mutely. “Thank fuck.” He hisses and leans toward Selina, head already lolling to the side weakly. 

Selina snorts at his swear and glances at the older man. She expects him to scold the boy but he only looks sad. 

Alfred steps away and licks his lips, unsure and almost nervous like. Bruce’s eyes follow him.

“Alfred?” It’s weak and wobbly and Selina thinks that it will do the trick.

She thinks Bruce knows this too. 

And sure enough the older man is sitting by Bruce’s feet again. Selina perches closer to his shoulder herself. It seems they both need the proximity of being by the younger Wayne. 

Bruce blinks sleepily before croaking again, “Alfred? Where- Where are we? Are you- ?”

Bruce attempts to sit up and Alfred and Selina jump to stop him. Bruce smiles softly but lets them nudge him back into the pillows.

“We’re in the Manor. You fainted.”

“Oh.” He seems surprised then confused, face scrunching up in thought. Alfred fidgets and stands again. Bruce makes an absorbed noise, quiet enough Alfred didn’t hear but Selina did.

“Tell me what’s going on, Bruce. Selina says you went into the sewers.”

Bruce’s entire face changes. His bunched muscles smooth into a look of indifference. Selina doesn’t say anything and watches.

“I did. What of it.”

Not a question. No real respect there. Ouch, Selina thinks, he’s already trying to get Alfred to leave again. The butler glares down at the young boy. 

“Why would you?”

Bruce stares out at something just past Alfred’s shoulder and says nothing. Selina shifts to brush against him. As her leg touches his side, he turns his head to look at her, and his face is so empty and lost looking her heart aches. 

“Bruce. Why were you in the sewer?” She asks this time. 

Bruce carefully looks over her entire face, eyes softening slightly. “I-I don’t know, really. I think...I think I was trying to figure something out.”

He shrugs and refuses to look at either of them, fingering at the edge of the blanket. Alfred sighs and crosses his arms.

“Figure out what? You’re not still trying to dig into the Court are you?”

Selina winces at the tone of his voice. He’s going straight into a scolding fatherly persona she’d seen a couple times before. What she didn’t see before was the angry flare in Bruce’s eyes.

Bruce slowly sits up and tosses his legs over the side of the bed in a movement to get up. Selina scoots down the bed and watches with a wary eye. 

“It has nothing to do with the Court.”

Alfred shakes his head, disbelieving. He steps closer to Bruce. “Then what?”

Selina can’t see Bruce face like this but she can image it from his vacant voice. Alfred too looks confused after Bruce speaks. 

“Then nothing. I went down there for something, obviously I didn’t get it. End of story.”

“Bullshit. You just don’t want to tell me.” Alfred hisses out. Bruce finally stands, going nose to nose with the older man. Selina involuntarily flexes, ready for a fight. 

“That’s exactly right, Alfred. Now, please.” Bruce turns away from them both and walks toward his dresser. “Leave.”

Selina’s a bit shocked at the words coming from her friend. Maybe he is a clone because her Bruce had enough emotional awareness to know when he needed help. Alfred bites his lip and overall looks upset. 

He struts to the door, footsteps angry and loud in the large room. “Bandage your shoulder before you bleed out, would yah?”

Bruce says nothing else and Alfred frowns, hurt and sad, before opening the door and closing it as he exists. 

Selina is confused but mostly worried. She says nothing and keeps watching the brunette.

“I was referring to the both of you, Selina.”

Cold, indifferent, inhuman.

Selina grits her teeth. “No. Someone’s gotta make sure you actually get a bandage on your open bleeding wound, Bruce.” She over stresses her words to show how really pissed, worried, scared, she is. 

There’s a big sigh from Bruce as he slowly wiggles out of his shirt and drops the ruined article to the ground. Selina stands up and approaches him slowly, like an injured animal. 

He doesn’t move. He’d opened his dresser and Selina can see the mirror hanging on the door. That’s what she guesses he’s looking at. 

“Where your first aid kit?”

“Bathroom.”

She nods and headed to the bathroom adjoined to his room. She’d alway hated how many rooms there where in this house. A bathroom right off a bedroom, at least four different times on one floor, was too much for her. But she was in and out, first aid kit in hand when she noticed how Bruce’s back looked different than before. 

There weren’t any weird scars she didn’t know about, so she assumed this couldn’t be the work of a garbage clone any longer. But his shoulders seemed broader, bigger, stronger than the last time she’d seen him. 

He was growing up. She was growing up.

They were growing up.

Selina decided that if Bruce didn’t want to share his issues she wouldn’t push him. They were adults or at least grown enough to know how to act like one. She got out the bandages from the kit and stepped up behind Bruce.

She was shorter than him. He was about a head and a half taller than her now. It was funny. He’d alway had such a soft baby looking face. The one of a child. But now, when she glances around his body and looks into the mirror she sees something else. 

Not yet a man, but something rough and hard, angry and lonely, sad and hurt, pleading and guilty. Bruce looked conflicted until he noticed her staring and his face went back to empty and blank. 

“You can tell me, Bruce. What’s going on?”

“I don’t want to Selina.”

She huffs and nudges his arm so he holds it up and out of her way. 

“That’s not good enough for me. I saw you down there. You freaked out.”

Bruce flinches at her first touch but steadily relaxes the longer and slower she makes her movements. She waits him out and keeps rolling the bandage over his shoulder.

“You wouldn’t understand. I don’t understand. Not- Not yet. But...maybe. When I do.”

Selina hums her approval at the promise of a conversation in the future. Bruce turns to face her and gives her the soft, calm and caring smile he’d always give her. 

She missed it more than she thought. Everything feels calmer, quieter, easier, around him. Especially when he’s looking at her like that. 

Bruce touches her hand briefly, as if asking, before taking her hand in his. She smiles back.

“I missed you. I miss us.” He says quietly and only for her. 

Selina feels a bit at odds though. Bruce is almost normal feeling right now but several things are buzzing in her mind. He’s killed someone, he’s ranted and raved like a lunatic in the sewer, he’s gone all weird and cold multiple times in her presence. How can she tell if he’s being honest here. 

Bruce seem to sense her indecision and lets go of her hand, soft look and caring eyes fading. “I miss the way it was before.”

“Before what?” She asks, voice quieter than she’d meant, but Bruce’s smile twitches back upward so she lets it slide. 

“Just before. Before I did...what I did. Before you did what you did. Before Alfred did what he did. Just before.”

Selina stiffens, feeling like she’s about to be blamed for something. “What are you talking about?”

Bruce must feel her sudden change because he takes a step away. “Selina, wait. I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Then what did you mean?” She growls, shoving the bandages back into the kit. He blinks and looks infinitely sadder than she’s ever seen him. 

“Before, before when I knew who I was, when I thought I knew you. When I thought I knew Alfred. When I thought...When I thought I knew me.”

Selina relaxes a touch because this doesn’t sound like a her thing as much anymore.

“You’ve always been Bruce Wayne. Just like I’ve always been Selina. And Alfred’s always been Alfred.” She offers. She doesn’t really know what he’s talking about but this is the most they’ve chatted in a while. She wants to keep talking.

But he looks away from her after she says her first point. He looks sad again. 

“But maybe it’s time we learn our new parts, huh?”

Bruce turns back to her, shocked and confused, but with a spark of hopefulness dancing in his eyes. “What?”

Selina’s shocked herself that she’s said something so corny and emotional but this. If she can have this, they could be friends again, they could be together again. She could feel less like lonely street trash and more like she had someone to rely on. She needs someone like that, to watch her back and keep up with her. 

Bruce can fit that roll again. She’d made the roll for him. 

“Well, we’ve all changed, Bruce. We’ve all grown up. We don’t know each like we did, before.”

He seems like he wants to accept her offer but the sudden nervousness in the air comes from him and pinching his fingers together. Selina stands tall and waits. Bruce will want this too. He wants her as much as she wants him.

“I can’t.”

It hurts. It hurt but what should she have expected it. Opening up to an attack she knew would come. Bruce doesn’t want her anymore. He’s changed. 

“Fine. Then we won’t. Take care of yourself, Bruce.” She walks quickly to the door. “And don’t forget what you already promised me.”

Closing the door is hard. Leaving is hard. Her heart hurts and her head hurts and everything else is buzzing. 

She shouldn’t have gotten her hopes up. Bruce is different now. So is she.

She doesn’t need him or his caring gentle spirit or his kind eyes and interest or helpfulness. She only needs herself. She’s been enough for herself for this long and she’s still alive.

She’s still alive.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  
If she had stayed a couple minutes longer she would have heard an explanation. She wouldn’t have liked it or understood it. But Bruce speaks anyway, to himself, he wants to hear it, wants her to hear it. 

“I can’t. I don’t even know who I am.”

The mirror is cruel and when he looks in it he sees someone else. A shadow of what he’s supposed to be. A crack down the Wayne name. A scared and cowardly child. Alone. 

He feels alone. 

His fist shatters the glass and he no longer feels anything.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina freaks out because Ivy is alive. Ivy is alive.

Ivy is alive and has a smoking hot body Selina’s never seen before. She’s Ivy alright but she’s grown too. Different but same. She still talks like a kid, still laughs like a kid, still thinks like a kid.

Selina’s missed her. 

Ivy however, if she’s missed Selina, doesn’t show it and simply tricks Selina into committing a crime.

Sure, she commits crime all the time. But she doesn’t murder people. She’d done that once and never wants to do it again. 

A small voice in the back of her head tells her she will, she will do it again, if it means surviving. And sometimes she thinks it’s right. 

But Ivy’s the one who killed an innocent man, in front of his whole hypnotised family. Selina no longer feels like Ivy is child-like. Ivy is dangerous and planning something Selina needs to stop. 

Ivy’s out to hurt people and usually Selina would let her. But this, this is her last second chance. She failed with Bridgit, she failed on some level with Bruce. She doesn’t want her one and only friend to go to jail. Or arkham. Or anywhere where she won’t be around for Selina to look after. 

Turns out none of that matters. Ivy wants to make all of Gotham her garden. She wants everyone to look like the guy she killed in his own house. She wants people to give her a dopey grin and do her bidding. Ivy is dangerous.

It breaks Selina’s heart to take it away from her. But there aren’t any other options. She can’t let Ivy poison every person in Gotham, take their free will, their lives. So she takes the Lazarus water and runs. 

Or tries too.

The water spills between them on the apartment floor and Ivy screeches like someone’s stabbed her. Selina figures now is the best of any to escape. 

Ivy starts laughing by the time she’s gotten to the window. Selina pauses because she really doesn’t want this to be it. 

“You shouldn’t have done that. You’re boyfriend’s gonna die now, he needed the water to cure the infection I gave him hours ago. But I bet if you hurry you can see him take his last breath and transform into the beautiful flower he was meant to be.”

Selina’s entire body flushes with cold. Bruce? She’d gotten to Bruce?

“Tell me how pretty he is when I see you next.” Ivy threatens, seriousness and rage boiling below her joking tone. Selina flees.

She hates herself for heading to Wayne Manor. Ivy could be lying. This could be a trap, a trick, Ivy could be regrouping and going for round two.

But deep down, Selina knows that what her best friend had said was the truth. 

Bruce is dying.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bruce is dying.

His mind is a going a mile a minute and nothing makes sense but he knows. He can feel it. 

It hurts.

He’s scared and missing his face, Ra’s took it, how funny is that, but it’s gone and he doesn’t know who he is. Who he was. But he needs his face back or he’ll completely lose it. 

He knows peoples names, their in his house, Gordon and Barbara, Lee and Harvey, Penguin and him. His face, his voice, his body, his house, his rules.

Bruce with no face is gone the second real Bruce touches him. 

It’s a trip, to know you’ve stolen your own face. He gets a brief flash back to a carnival and the too bright lights and a dirty puddle and flesh and blood and the face of a stranger looking so glad to see him.

He’s lost in his own house, in his own head, and he’s dying. 

The thing feeding on his flesh and blood grows stronger. It hurts.

Bruce doesn’t remember why everyone is suddenly gone and he’s left alone. All the windows are open but there’s no cat. And why would there be? He doesn’t have a cat. He doesn’t have anything. 

But still a hand grabs him and points him to the city. Jim Gordon telling him where he belongs, calling him out on his hiding. Where else is he supposed to go? There’s nowhere else but here. 

He turns to ask but Gordon and his mustache are gone. Bruce is alone with the city shining brightly ahead of him, behind him, everywhere, always everywhere. In his blood and in his brain. 

The light gets a noise that sounds like a helicopter, and how does he know what that sounds like, but where is it coming from? His house? He has a helicopter?

But it’s Alfred, smashing through glass and grabbing him, wearing military gear, what’s happening, Alfred is a butler.

Alfred is taking him to see someone, he’s in the trunk of a car and they’re moving, Gotham is all around but he can’t see anything but the darkness of the car. Helicopter to car to Gotham to an alleyway.

Something huge and voidless jumps across the fire exists and something bad is about to happen. Bruce doesn’t need to see the thing to know. He senses it, hears it, aches with it.

The alleyway is covered with fog but Bruce can tell, he can feel it, it happened here. And that thought reveals chalk drawings of the last positions of his parents. Two chalk people reaching for each other. Bruce shakes and looks up into the spotlight.

“What do you want? Why did you bring me here?! There is where my parents were killed!” He screams, two voices becoming one. He feels childish and angry and vengeful. Everything hurts.

“NO.” The things booms and Bruce is frozen. 

That voice and his voice, why do they sound like that? Why does he know this thing? Why is he scared out of his mind? Why is he going to die here? Why wasn’t it him? Why couldn’t he have gone too? Why?!

“THIS IS WHERE I WAS BORN.”

It clicks too late and the thing jumps down on top of him and he screams and screams and screams. The night sky is as quiet as it was the first time. The stars aren’t forgiving and the fog never existed. Shiny shoes reflect his entire life and the blood on the streets is his own. 

He wakes in a cave. It’s so dark and empty and cold.

He’s afraid, he’s going to die, it hurts.

Droplets of water echo in the caverness place and Bruce is dizzy with all the noises and environment. He can hear squeaks of what he knows are bats. He’d fallen down into a bat cave once, he’d broken his arm and cried about it for a couple hours until Alfred found him.

But here, now, there’s no Alfred to save him, there’s no hole to crawl out of, and his arm isn’t the only part of him he’s worried about, he’s going to be broken here, again and he’s terrified, there’s nowhere else to go because this is the last place he’d ever be in his life. 

That’s exactly why they brought him here. 

“Who’s there! Show yourself!” he shouts himself hoarse trying to pretend he’s still in control of this situation, of this mind. There’s a flutter of wings behind him and as he turns around the thing is standing there, half hidden in the caves shadows. 

“Who-Who are you?” it comes out more curious and awed than he meant. It’s the best look he’s gotten of them since that night.

The thing cocks their head and says, “I AM THE ONE YOU CAN NOT ESCAPE.”

And it echos within him and he feels it, feels them then, and they keep going but their voice is no longer booming and threatening. It’s familiar. 

“THE ONE YOU CAN NOT KILL.”

Bats chitter around them and suddenly everything is clear. 

“You’re me.” he says, breathless with the realization, with the knowledge he knew he had before but ignored. 

Something else clicks in his mind. There can’t be two of them. There can’t be. It’s either them or him. And he already knows who will win.

“Please-”

“YOU’RE SCARED.”

No boom or thunder behind the words, almost a sort of confusion. He himself feels confused because no it’s not him who’s scared anymore.

There’s a slight tug on his pant leg and he looks down and understands.

A ten year old Bruce Wayne looks up at him with wide, horrified eyes and dry blood on his hands, as he grips tightly onto his pant leg.

This is who is afraid. This is the one they can not kill. The one they can not escape. 

Three of them in a cave with bats and fear and darkness.

This is who they are. This is apart of them. This is who they must become. 

He reaches his hand out to them and rests his free hand on top of young Bruce’s head. If they are going to do this, they need to do it together. 

Darkness and a warped reflection and fear. Together.

The thing hesitates before taking his hand and they erupt into a swarm of bats and screeching and he can hear soft pants of an upset child and he hears his name.

Suddenly they wake up.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina doesn’t push her luck, but there’s a cop car in the driveway and she can only hope it’s Jim Gordon coming to save the day. If he’s here then Bruce will be okay.

Probably.

Damn, she thinks as she crawls closer to an open window, Bruce better be alive.

She hears the faint hint of voices and she carefully scoots closer.

Bruce is alive, he’s coughing and spitting, but it’s definitely Bruce. Gordon is right beside him, rubbing his back and offering comforting words.

Lucius Fox is there too, someone Selina’s only really ever heard of, and he’s picking and poking at the green lumps of flesh Bruce must have coughed up.

Selina doesn’t want to linger too long, she needs to nab Ivy and get her to understand normal human morals again, but she waits and gives herself the sight of Bruce standing up with Gordon’s aid.

“Where’s your mustache?” Bruce asks sluggishly and only wobbles slightly after Gordon let's go in surprise. Yeah, Selina thinks he’ll be okay. 

She leaves to go find Ivy and actually talk to the little brat. 

This is already shaping up to be a hell of a week. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Waking up this time is different from any other. They do it together, eyes wide and the world in a horribly sharp focus. There’s gagging and choking and something flowery falls out of their mouth. It hurts. 

There’s warm, strong hands on their back and comforting words in their ears. They stare down at their hands and realize who they finally are. 

Bruce Wayne. The coward kid, the broken mirror, the shadow. Together.

He turns his head then, only slightly confused as to what's happened. Jim Gordon offers a relieved smile and keeps rubbing his back, mouth moving but no words processing yet. He looks to his other side and see Lucius, with his curious science face and poking at something near his feet. 

Noise comes back slowly but once he’s able to hear Jim’s words he groans, weakly grabbing at his pounding head. Jim stops rubbing his back but keeps his hands on Bruce’s shoulders.

Bruce coughs a little and leans against Jim to try and stand. A single distorted thought enters their head. 

“Where’s your mustache?” 

Jim’s face goes open and surprised, his eyes popping even wider. Jim’s hands also jump a bit and leave Bruce’s person for a short moment before they are back on.

Jim huffs an unsure laugh, “I don’t quite know what you mean, Bruce. You’ve been drugged.”

It all comes back and they remember what happened dark and deep in their mind. 

“Ivy.”

“That’s right. She poisoned you with some kind of plant.” Lucius concludes, wrapping up whatever Bruce had coughed up and tucking it away in his pocket. He hurriedly joins to Bruce’s other side.

“Yes. She scratched us.”

“Us?” Is Jim’s worried reply. “Is Alfred here?”

“No. He’s still living in the city.” Lucius says the same time Bruce says, “No. He no longer lives here. 

They share a brief look, but Bruce can’t be annoyed with Lucius for keeping tabs on his butler. Jim, on the other hand, gives Bruce an all too familiar look. Parental and fatherly, about to scold him but also reveal show much he cares and worries about him.

Alfred always looked like that.

“I’m fine.” Bruce snaps before Jim says anything and pulls away from the two adults. They both look skeptical but let him limp away from them toward the closest window. 

It’s cold in the room but Bruce honestly can’t notice it. He sees the lights of the city and longs. 

“Did she say anything about where she could be going?” Jim asks quietly, not approaching him but speaking to his back. Bruce feels something tighten and solidify. 

This was part of who Jim and Bruce would always be. Fighting together but separately. Two different fronts. Dangerous together, stronger together. All of Bruce trusts Jim to do good.

He tells the truth. “She’s planning something, high scale. I don’t remember any details about it. I’m sorry.”

Jim nods and final steps beside Bruce to look out the window. “Lucius said that the toxin attacks the brain and causes a hallucinatory reaction. I doubt it was pleasant. But nothing about it was real.”

“It was.” Bruce says before Jim can even finish his last sentence. “I saw who I really am. It was real.”

Jim gives him a sideways glance, doubt and concern playing over his face. Bruce decides he doesn’t like it. Jim clears his throat and steps a little further in front so he can speak to Bruce directly.

“Most people go their whole lives without knowing, you’re lucky.”

Lucky, he thinks, lucky. Lucky to spend the rest of his life being split into different parts of himself. To lose and find and lose and find and create and lose again and again. An endless cycle that he sees no relief from. It hurts.

But oddly enough, he proud of it. Of them. They found peace and compromise once, they can do it again, and again, and again, as many times as it takes because they are together. They are Bruce Wayne.

“I’m not lucky. You didn’t see it.”

Jim’s face changes from one of pitying to one of simple understanding. He reaches out and rests a hand on Bruce’s shoulder.

“I’ve seen my own darkness. Just know that there are people who care, who are here, for you, Bruce. You’re never alone.”

And Jim is right. He won’t ever be alone again. No more shiny shoes and broken pearls and meaningless stars. He’s different now, together, strong, able. 

He’s not alone. He’s Bruce Wayne. 

Jim nods and takes the silence as his cue to leave. Bruce feels his lips quiver into a hesitant smile. “Jim?”

The man turns and raises his eyebrows in question.

“I saw you, while I was under. You had a mustache. You looked good.”

Jim smiles smally back and feels his upper lip as if there’s a mustache there now. He chuckles to himself and says as he’s walking away. “That must've been a hell of a drug!”

Bruce thinks he’s right. 

But all and all, drug or no, he’s whole. He’s Bruce Wayne. He’s ready. 

He calls Alfred. It’s time. 

He gets the answering machine and it hurts, deep down, an empty ache, but he leaves a vague message he hopes the older man will respond to. 

He wonders what’s happening in the city as he stares out at its lights from afar. 

He can’t wait to know. 

He can’t wait to be there.

He can’t wait to become what he’s meant to be. 

He’s ready to be Bruce Wayne completely and infinitely. No more regrets or self sorrow. It’s time to start anew, erase the past and move forward. Learn from what’s been done and succeed in what’s to come. 

He’s never been more a peace than he is right now. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Selina ends up losing Ivy somewhere around the outside of town and decides that when the twarp tries to show her face again Selina will be there to kick her ass. Meanwhile it sounds like thing at the club are heating up.

Barbara has some kind of gift from Ra’s Al Ghul.

Selina is skeptical as whether it’s really a gift or not. Tabby feels the same. But Barbara thinks she’s got a greater destiny or some shit Selina can’t find herself to care about.

Because now she knows who Bruce killed.

Bruce killed Ra’s Al Ghul.

She’s not sure what to do with that. She’s not sure if she should go talk to Bruce or not. She thinks she deserved to know way earlier and she’s kinda nervous to see how he is now. It’s been about two days since the Ivy attack and poison. She wants to visit him and check up but she can’t stop looking for the stupid red head who created this mess.

Of course Selina gets her wish because Ivy attacks the Wayne Foundation Ceremony. 

It seems that thing gets crashed by crazy people every year. Jerome, the clown boy. Galavant, in turn. Some crazy gas. And now Ivy and her evil plants.

Damn Gotham is weird. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bruce would be pissed if this didn’t give him the perfect opportunity to prove to Alfred how serious he is. But Ivy’s evil plants are scary and dangerous and Alfred and the cops can deal with that. He’s going after the guns.

He’s going after the men who remind him of shiny shoes and pearls. He’s going to let off a little steam. And it’s more fun than he’d thought, breaking someone’s face with his fist and watching them bounce off the floor when he lands a good kick. 

He’s not alone anymore. He feels good. 

At least up until Jim shoots him in the chest. 

It’s sudden and jarring and it’s Gordon of all people. It hurts but he plays possum for all of five seconds before darting down the dark hallways. He can hear Jim right behind him, shouting and threatening to shoot again. The roof is the only option.

Thank god for fire escapes and his flexible trained body. He’s gone before Jim even touches the roof’s entrance door. He tucks himself into the shadows and listens, breathing quietly and tightening his body to stay still. 

Gordon doesn’t waste much time on the roof before going back into the building. He’s a busy guy after all, what with saving the Wayne Foundation Ceremony, and Bruce scrambles down the rest of the way.

Alfred was right, they needed this. This is who they are. And they like it. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ivy escapes but Selina thinks she catches a glimpse of Bruce. He’s carefully and quickly climbing down a fire escape in nothing but a black outfit.

It reminds her of the thing in downtown Gotham and again she wonders. It’d make a strange sort of sense. Bruce could never keep his nose out of it if he thought he could help. 

She’ll have to talk to him about that too. But right now she’s going home because she’s so tired of chasing Ivy and the worry and the guilt.

She goes back to the Sirens to sleep it off.

She’s half way there when she remembers Bruce’s birthday is tomorrow.

This week really does suck.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It’s their birthday and they’re tired of pretending to be one. He’s decided to try and tell Alfred. He’s worried the butler won’t understand but he has to try. Alfred deserves to know. 

Alfred ends up getting him a high tech sneak car and Bruce has honestly never been that excited about cars but this, this is so much better than running across rooftops in spandex and kevlar. 

Even with the car he’ll need the spandex and kevlar but still. It’s a nice gift. And it represents a lot. Alfred is trusting him again wholeheartedly and he’s not sure if he’s ready for that yet. That’s just another thing to try and explain to his friend.

Alfred also makes a cake. And yeah, Bruce gets excited about cakes. He sits on a nearby stool and observes as Alfred prepares everything.

“Alfred? I need to...tell you something.”

“Eh? What’s up, master B?” Bruce decides he did miss Alfred’s accent and offers the older man a weak smile before continuing.

“Um. This might be confusing but we thought you deserved to know.” He pauses and tries to gauge Alfred’s reaction. The butler mostly looks confused but with the parental kindness Bruce has grown used to. “There’s uh- There’s more than one...Bruce Wayne.”

Alfred shifts and looks like he thinking before he laughs, “Oi! I know about the clone, I was there! And I’m not making another cake for that little heathen. God knows where he even is right now.” He turns to the stove and picks up a bowl.

Bruce frowns at the miscommunication but decides that this is okay too. He’s wanted to talk about his clone as well. “He’s on a boat off the east coast.”

Alfred whips back around, the batter in the bowl slouching dangerously. “What?! How the bloody hell do you know that?”

“I’ve been in contact with him. He sends letters.”

“What?! Since when?! Why?!” Alfred keeps exclaiming and eventually some of the batter splats onto the counter. The butler doesn’t even notice. 

“He’s written me several letters. It probably started about three months ago. After the whole...Ra’s and Court thing.”

Alfred frowns and slams the bowl down. “You didn’t write him back did you?”

Bruce squirms a little under the glare. “Um. Not at first.”

“Bruce!”

“What? There’s not harm in it. He’s different now.” He leaves off the ‘I’m different now’ that tingles the back of his throat. “He’s changed. He doesn’t even go by Bruce anymore. He’s...He’s got a family now.”

Alfred’s angry looks turns stunned and Bruce decides now is a good time to show the butler the photos and letters.

“I’ll be right back.” He says before speeding off to his room. He digs under the bed and pulls out the beat up shoe box. It’s a box of memories and shame. He pops it open and grabs the pictures of Five and his family. Alfred is going to flip.

“He goes by Five now, and here, this is the boat he lives on.” Bruce says as he walks in, quickly sifting through the handful of photos to give Alfred the right one. 

The picture he’s talking about is a smaller one, mostly the boat and the ocean with two people standing on board waving to the camera, it’s also one of the only one’s Five took by himself. 

The two people on board are the older fisherman, Five calls him Gills, and the fisherman’s son, Eric, who Five calls cute. 

Bruce smiles down at the picture before handing it over to Alfred. “That’s Gills and his son, Eric. Five took this one.”

Alfred just holds the photo and gapes, mouth open in pure shock and disbelief. Bruce chuckles a little. “Wait til you see what Five looks like. Only he can pull off the long hair.”

Bruce searches through the pictures again until he finds one of Five. The one he holds out to Alfred is a picture taken by Eric when Five wasn’t looking.

Five is staring out into the ocean as the sunsets and makes everything pink. The long scar across Five’s face shines in the light and his even longer hair is pulled back into a low ponytail. He’s wearing pineapple swim shorts and a tank top with some foreign brand across it. He’s holding an ice cream cone that’s half melted over his arm and he’s smiling smally into the distance.

Overall Five looks goofy and happy and Bruce feels it second hand. He’s glad one of them got to have a family, got to be happy with that family. He’s careful when he hands it to Alfred.

The older man’s surprise and disbelief seems to ebb away when he sees the next one, a more sorrowful expression take its place. 

“Alfred?” He asks, confused and concerned. He figure’d Alfred would be angry, not sad over all of this.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you that.”

Bruce blinks, not quite understanding. “Give me what?”

Alfred sighs and sets the photos down, away from the batter splatter, and rests his elbows on the counter. He looks tired and weary and too much like an old man. 

“I’m sorry I couldn’t give you a normal life.”

Bruce doesn’t know what to say because, because Alfred has done nothing but make sure he’s okay, worked hard every day to keep him safe, and he doesn’t even have to. Nothing is keeping Alfred here by Bruce’s side. 

“Alfred, please. You’ve made me happy, you’ve made me brave, you’ve helped every time I’ve ever needed it and then some. You- You make me happy. Isn’t that...isn’t that better than normal?”

Alfred looks back up and there’s tears in his eyes. Bruce swallows, unsure if those are good or bad tears before Alfred steps out from behind the counter and grabs him in a tight hug. 

Bruce smiles and wraps his arms around his father.

It’s the best birthday he’s had in a while. And they haven’t even gotten to the cake.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The week starts to sucks less when she sneaks into Wayne Manor and smells cake. It sucks less when she hears Bruce’s quiet huff of a laugh. It sucks less when she sees that Alfred is in the kitchen and smiling back at Bruce.

It sucks less when Bruce sees her. He smiles, like he’d done before, eyes full of happiness and care. She immediately feels her stress slip off her shoulders.

They’re going to be okay. All of them. 

She gives a playful jab towards Alfred with her fist and he makes a weird sort of smile, not quite what he gives Bruce, but it’s amused and affectionate about the same. Bruce chuckles beside her and starts to cut into his cake. 

He’s nineteen now. 

She finds out he got a car for his birthday. A car just for him for whenever he wants. Selina thinks it’s a bold move on Alfred’s part, to offer such freedom so quickly after what Bruce has been up to, but they seem to have some kind of agreement so she doesn’t mention it. 

Selina hangs out late into the night and soaks as much happy Bruce as she can. She doesn’t know when he’ll flip a switch and go back to the void of no emotions but she’ll take what she can get. 

Once Alfred finally retires for the night, what goofy a saying is that, Selina gets up the courage to ask Bruce some long needed questions.

“Did you kill Ra’s Al Ghul?”

Bruce’s birthday buzz drops immediately. But instead of going blank he sighs and sets down his drink. 

“Bruce did. We...We did. We had too.” He pauses and corrects himself.

“We?”

Bruce looks up at her and something is different but not as drastic as before so she can’t really notice. “Yes. Bruce Wayne.”

Selina squints her eyes to portray her confusion because what? Bruce and who? What is he talking about?

“Are you drunk? High? You’re not making any sense.”

Bruce’s expression shutters off even more and he swirls his drink. “I knew you wouldn’t get it.”

“Bruce, c’mon.”

“Just ask your other questions, Selina.” He snaps a little and takes a quick sip before facing her again. 

Selina bites her lip but does as he asks. “What are you doing at night in the bad part of town? I’ve seen you. And I know it’s you.”

Bruce blinks, fairly surprised before smirking a little. “How’d you figure that out? Alfred doesn’t even know.”

“You got stabbed in the shoulder, dumbass.”

“Oh.” Another blank expression before he looks at her again. “That makes sense.”

“Okay. So it is you, but why?” She asks, scooting closer to get a better look into his brown eyes. He offers her a small smile before staring into his drink.

“Simple. Why not?”

It’s Selina’s turn to blink in surprise. Because her Bruce is so logical to a fault. He plans and over plans and has reasons for things. Nothing is pure random with Bruce. 

“No. You’re lying c’mon.”

“I am not.” He says seriously, even with a slight pout. He swallows the last of his drink and stretches. “We do it because no one else will. Is that a better reason?”

“You did it again. With the ‘we’ talk.”

Bruce’s face evens out into an expression of nothingness. Selina feels a tingle go up her spine. 

“That because there’s more than one.” Bruce says calmly but with an underlying warning in his voice. 

“More than one what?”

Bruce shakes his head and stands up. “Selina, you wouldn’t understand. It’s okay. I’m glad you came tonight. Thank you.” He smiles and means it. He heads toward the hallway.

Selina relaxes a little but doesn’t smile back yet. “Bruce.”

He pauses in the doorway and turns his head to looks back at her. “Yes?”

She smiles then and says, “I missed you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bruce's illness isn't as straightforward in this part but it's still very much an issue that hasn't been addressed properly by the other characters yet. 
> 
> I have one more part in mind to finish off this monster piece and I think I'll be satisfied.

**Author's Note:**

> trigger warnings:  
> There is a scene where it is implied that Bruce wants to commit suicide, it's very brief and not explicitly said. He also drinks something that is roofied fully knowing it's been drugged.  
> There's also brief descriptions of violence, vomit and blood but nothing gorey or gross.
> 
> Kudos to whoever can guess the disorder I'm trying to subtly show (and head cannon) with Bruce's actions/dialogue


End file.
